Graphical internet search system and methods

ABSTRACT

A system and methods for web based graphical internet searching for locating unique items sought by buyers of designs, furnishings and accessories through use of the internet. The invention includes a search interface where both a seller and buyer will use the same graphical alphabet, which divides an item into its component parts, to decipher the language of design which has an infinite number of stylistic combinations.

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS

This application is a continuation of application Ser. No. 10/758072,filed 16 Jan. 2004 now U.S. Pat. No. 7,315,833 which claims priorityfrom provisional application 60/440324 filed on 16 Jan. 2003. Theapplication is incorporated herein by reference.

This application claims the benefit of U.S. Provisional PatentApplication No. 60/440,324, filed Jan. 16, 2003, entitled “Web BasedInterface for Graphical Internet Searching” by Roger A. Schrenk. Theteachings of the provisional patent application are incorporated hereinby reference in their entirety.

FIELD OF THE INVENTION

The invention relates to an online marketplace for uniquely designeditems, and more particularly, to a web based interface for graphicalinternet searching that allows buyers and sellers to communicate withone another through the use of images rather than text.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

Currently all search techniques on the internet require people to typein words or phrases to describe what they want to buy or sell. Whilethis model is efficient for standardized goods such as books, cars, CDsand machine parts that require nothing more than a model number,quantity or price to exchange, such a model is inefficient for complexgoods like furniture and textiles for instance, whose descriptions canvary from person to person. There is currently no way on the Internetfor an individual to search for what they want without the use of textas the primary search tool.

Consider if two people were asked to write a description of a chair, itis unlikely that their descriptions would match. Why? Because the termsand phrases needed to describe the chair accurately belong to a verycomplex stylistic language that is unfamiliar to the majority of thepopulation. Stylistically this chair can be called Victorian,Renaissance Revival or Greek Revival. Its form can be called a sidechair, a parlor chair, a lady's chair or even a slipper chair dependingon its height. A similar range of options exists for the possiblematerials used in the chair and for its condition. The general publiccannot be expected to know all the stylistic terms associated with thischair. Nevertheless, current search models on the internet offer noalternative to the use of text. They simply assume that both buyer andseller are using the same vocabulary when searching for highly complexitems, but they're not.

The logical alternative to the use of text is that of images. If twopeople were given a picture of the chair discussed above and then weretold to find that chair among many similar but different chairs in thesame room, they would likely choose the same chair. Why? Because peoplecan match complex items a lot quicker with a picture than with a writtendescription. By comparison, if the same two people were placed in a roomhaving many different chairs and were told to find the one that wasRenaissance Revival, their ability to choose the correct chair woulddepend on their knowledge of furniture styles, not on their naturalability to identify similar images.

Current online models have their limitations such as auctions. Onlineauctions have drawn a lot of attention recently due to the incrediblesuccess of Ebay.com, a multi-billion dollar company based in San Jose,Calif. Ebay provides a space for buyers and sellers to bid on millionsof items which are divided into one of several categories such asantiques, metalware, pottery and textiles etc. Buyers find sellers byentering “keywords” or phrases that match descriptions given to theitems by the sellers. Buyers are allowed to bid on the itemselectronically for up to 10 days at which time the bidding ends and theitem is awarded to the highest bidder. Ebay does not guarantee oradminister the actual exchange of the item. It simply provides a mediumthrough which a trade can take place. It is up to the buyer and theseller to complete the transaction once the auction has ended. Tradersare allowed to post comments or complaints about one another. Thesecomments are publicly accessible and therefore shape the reputations ofthe traders.

Ebay exacts a fee from the seller for listing the item and a commissionbased on the item's auction price. The buyer pays nothing to use Ebay.

Online auctions are limited by their reliance on text-based descriptionsand by the cost of shipping.

While Ebay is turning a profit, its usefulness as an exchange-mechanismis limited to a very narrow range of items—items that require verylittle information to describe and are shipped at little cost. Suchitems include small collectibles like Hummel figurines, and name-branditems like Coach leather goods. Because these items are easily describedby their production number, name or form, and can be shipped cheaply,the number of buyers who can compete for them is vast as compared tothat for large, cumbersome items that are difficult to describe andcostly to transport.

For example, if one were to conduct a search on Ebay for the chairdiscussed above, he would be faced with several problems. The firstwould be choosing the keywords to best describe the item. The secondproblem is one of trust. Is the chair really as the seller hasdescribed? Has it been repaired? Is it comfortable etc.? Third, how muchwill it cost to ship it? Keep in mind that Ebay is globally accessibleand the chair could be (and often is) hundreds of miles away. So what isthe incentive of buying a chair through Ebay that cannot be physicallyinspected because of its distance or is interchangeable with chairsfound locally that can be transported at little cost? There is none.

Online brokers have their limitations, especially those that handledecorative art, specialize in one category or range of items, and theycater to clients who desire such items. The information on theirWebsites is arranged according to the knowledge and expertise of theirclients. An example is Circline.com, based in New York.

Circline.com is a broker site for very rare and expensive decorative artand antiques. It too requires users to enter text when searching for anobject, but it does not face the same miscommunication problems betweenbuyers and sellers that can occur in an auction setting. This is due tothe high level of education and familiarity that Circline's clients havewith stylistic terms. Buyers and sellers find one another quickly onCircline because they share a common understanding of how objects aredescribed. Additionally, shipping costs are not of great concern becauseof the expense, rarity and desirability of the items.

Depending on their level of service, brokers administer every step of atransaction to varying degrees. Circline for instance fields allinquiries about the items for sale, arranges the payment schedulebetween the parties, handles the transportation and insurance,guarantees the satisfaction of the parties and protects the identity ofthe seller. This is done for a fee based on the listed price of theitem.

Online brokers are useful only to a small portion of thepopulation—those who have a cultivated knowledge of what they want andthe financial resources to afford it.

Because their target audience has a high level of expertise, onlinebrokers assume that their clients will be able to use text and keywordsearches successfully when describing what they want. Online brokers arehighly specialized entities and are not suited to meet the needs of thegeneral public.

Storefronts are websites that are owned and operated by independentsellers of goods. Storefronts are usually nothing more than an onlinecatalogue of inventories housed in one location—typically physical shopsor warehouses. The inventories of decorative art and antique sites forinstance are grouped by their form or use like tables and chairs, ormore generally like bedroom and parlor furniture. Because the user hasno way of specifying what he wants beyond the basic form of the item, heis forced to browse the entire inventory in the hope of findingsomething he likes.

Buyers are sent to different storefronts on the Internet through searchengines. A search engine is nothing more than a service used to findinformation on the Internet. Search engines recommend different sitesaccording to words or phrases entered by the user. If a user does notknow the online address of a particular site, then he must locate thesite through a search engine by using terms that describe what the userwants.

Storefronts allow buyers to browse the collections of many storeswithout having to leave home. Because the inventories can be viewedanywhere at any time, storefront sites have increased the sellers'market reach tremendously.

Finding a particular shop online is fairly simple, but locating aspecific item is extremely difficult and time consuming. There is no wayfor a consumer to find what he wants on the Internet directly withoutfirst being sent through multiple layers of search. Once an item isfound however, the cost to ship it may be prohibitive relative to itsprice and rarity in the market.

Online storefronts along with auctions and broker sites are depositoriesfor the majority of saleable items on the Internet. They are all textbased—meaning that if a buyer wishes to locate a particular item withinthe site he must enter keywords in order to specify what he wants.Unfortunately, as explained earlier, text is only useful when thedesired item can be described with a few common or widely know terms. Ifa buyer is unable to articulate what he wants in the form of words, thenhis/her efforts to find that item on the internet will be futile?

The Internet currently offers consumers no alternative to text-basedsearches.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

The invention is a new and unique online service that combines elementsof item searching and trade facilitation. At its core is a visual searchengine that represents a complete taxonomy of a class of uniquelydesigned items. The inventive system and methods abandon text as theprimary search tool and allows consumers to identify what they want bychoosing from a series of images-images that approximate the consumer'sneed.

The basic premise is that a shopper will have a mental picture of anitem with enough specificity that he or she can describe the desireditem based on picking from a palette of likely and distinctive imagesdepicting the variations in a given item's attributes. By progressingthrough a step-wise process of narrowing down a search to a particularform (chair, table, sofa) and then type (arm chair, side chair) offurniture, the application will prompt the shopper to pick severalvisual attribute “Chips” from an interface we refer to as an AttributeChooser. Other desired characteristics will be available for inclusionin the search filtration (e.g. dimensions, finish, etc.) in the form oftraditional text entry boxes, drop-down menus, check boxes and radiobuttons.

An example, if a buyer wished to purchase the chair discussed earlier,all he would have to do is select an image of that chair from among avisual catalogue of styles. The online service would then compare hisselection to what was available for sale and present it on the screen.By relying on images rather than text, the service would not requireconsumers to know all the stylistic vocabulary necessary to describesuch a chair. Furthermore, sellers would have an easier time listingtheir products on the service because they too would be able tocatalogue their items using the same images. It follows then that bothbuyers and sellers would communicate more effectively because they wouldbe using a common language of images instead of the subjective languageof text.

Upon pressing search, the shopper is presented with thumbnails ofmatches, if any. Resultant thumbnails are clickable to reveal furtheritem information and seller contact information. The application is notintended to broker transactions between buyers and sellers. It willgenerate revenue through charges it assess sellers to list items, salesof first-refusal rights to buyers seeking items matching a particularcombination of descriptors, and sales of advertising space to relevantvendors, merchants and service providers.

Additionally, the service would take into consideration the physicallocation of the consumer and would identify the goods closest to wherehe lived. By doing so, the service would allow consumers to narrow theirsearch to a few local shops. This would save consumers a great deal oftime when ordinarily they would have to physically drive around townsearching for what they wanted. Also by finding the item closest towhere the consumer lived, the service would reduce the cost oftransporting the item to the consumer's home.

A wish list and a right of first refusal on the website will draw theattention and gain critical support from the community of likely buyers,sellers and advertisers.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

FIG. 1 is a schematic representation of a system for facilitatingelectronic commerce in uniquely designed articles.

FIG. 2 illustrates a screen display of a web home page.

FIG. 3 illustrates a screen display of second web home page.

FIG. 4 illustrates a screen display of a main search page.

FIG. 5 illustrates a screen display for attribute choosing.

FIG. 6 illustrates a screen display results from a search request.

FIG. 7 illustrates a screen display of vendor listings.

FIG. 8 illustrates a screen display of detailed item selection.

FIG. 9 illustrates a screen display for administrative selections.

FIG. 10 illustrates a screen display of administrative reporting.

FIG. 11 illustrates a second screen display of administrative reporting.

FIG. 12 shows an approximate interpretation of a desired attributefeature.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

The following is a description of is how the new service would work fora buyer searching for furniture. Referring to FIG. 1, the service isaccessed over the internet 100 by a user via client 110. A search engineserver 120 is located on a website that has an address. Search engineserver 120 has a data repository 130 associated with it. A buyer logsonto the Internet 100 and enters the address of the website into theaddress field on his client computer screen.

Site visitors will not be required to create a public account to use thesite—if site visitors wish to try the site without identifyingthemselves, they may do so by designating their zip code. The indicatedzip code will be stored in a session variable and can be stored in apermanent cookie; otherwise the user must re-enter their zip code whenthey begin their next session. This group is referred to above as casualshoppers. Others in the general public audience container create useraccounts in order to realize other benefits of the search service and tolist items.

Once zip code is known, search results and advertisements are contextualto it, although in certain interfaces, the circumference of the searcharea around the site visitor's zip code can be altered to broaden ornarrow search and advertiser result listings. The website only uses theaccount holder's self-classification to ascertain audience demographicstatistics and formulate marketing strategies.

A welcoming home page 200 appears as shown in FIG. 2. The site asks thebuyer if he is a buyer or a seller and where he is located. His locationcan be determined from his zip code entry 202. The person selects“buyer” and enters his zip code. A buyer may have an established accounthaving a user name and password which is submitted through button 204.The buyer is then asked what is the general form of the item he islooking for—table, chair, desk, mirror etc. in section 206. Once theform has been chosen, the buyer is shown a main search screen shown inFIG. 4 that is separated into distinct fields or menus.

Each menu corresponds to a particular physical characteristic found onthe furniture form the buyer has chosen. The menus for a chair 402, forexample, would include back 404, seat 406, leg/foot 408 and arm 410.Each menu contains stylized sketches of all possible examples 412 ofeach characteristic. For instance, square seats, round seats, slipseats; shaped seats etc. are all shown in pictures. Shown in FIG. 5 isthe screen display 550 containing chair backs 502 that represent allpossible examples of backs of chair. The buyer then chooses the type ofseat he wants, and so on. Once the buyer has chosen all the desiredcharacteristics for his item, the service searches its database andchooses the items that match the buyer's choices. The attribute selectedthe closer the buyer will come to his desired selection.

Of those items, the service shows first the one that is located closestgeographically to the buyer according to his zip code. The acceptablerange of search range was presented and selected by buyer in the homepage view 300 shown in FIG. 3. The buyer then views all the optionspresented as a result of the search and choose the one he likes themost. Typical search results 602 are shown as screen display 600 in FIG.6. The search can be further refined and run again.

Upon finding a match, the buyer is given a full description of the item.This description shown in screen display 800 of FIG. 8 includesinformation on who owns the chair, where it is and its cost, as well asany notes the sellers chose to include. The buyer is then left to decidewhether or not to contact the seller. The seller is listed in screendisplay 700 shown in FIG. 7 which shows a vendor listing of eightmatches.

An example of how the service would work for a seller follows. TheSeller logs onto the Internet and goes to the service just as the buyerdoes. He is asked if he is a buyer or seller. See FIG. 2 for home pageview. He chooses “seller” and is prompted to give his account number orestablish an account so that the service can identify him and thelocation of the item being sold. It then asks what is the general formof the item he wishes to sell—table chair, etc. In this case he chooses“chair”. Once the form has been chosen, the seller is shown the samescreen for chairs that the buyer was shown previously. It is broken intothe same menus that correspond to the different physical characteristicsfound on chairs. The seller chooses from among the images shown in eachmenu until he has chosen all the characteristics that match the chair hewishes to sell. The seller is then prompted to “upload” an image of hischair to the service along with any notes or messages he would like toadd. This is done electronically and is well know in the art. It isnothing more than sending a file of the image like one would send ane-mail message. The only special equipment needed is a digital camera orscanner—both widely available and affordable. Once the image isuploaded, the service attaches the image to the visual characteristicschosen by the seller. The image is stored by the service through thesearch engine server 120 onto data repository 130. The data is madeavailable according to how much time, the number of hits or the otherservice fee arrangement the seller has paid for. Because the seller hasalready entered his account information, the service can identify him toany buyers who may inquire about his chair and can bill him for theservice.

Advertiser audience members hold a different account from general siteusers, and may be provided a separate URL (such as ads.IDODA.com) forsigning in, in the interest of keeping their site traffic somewhatseparate from the regular site. This separation is also being usedinstead of merging advertisers with general public accounts because itis not expected that advertisers will typically be running listings orshopping, other than to observe how their ads appear in context.Advertisements appear on the home page screen displays shown in FIGS. 2and 3 as well as on search results screen displays shown in FIGS. 6, 7and 8.

Advertisers' accounts will be recorded in the same table as regular useraccounts, but with a flag marking their records as being advertiseraccounts. The account behaves as any other user account, otherwise. Butwhen an advertiser logs in, he or she is presented with an additionalnavigational element allowing him or her to review their ad performance,upgrade or renew their ad.

Ads appear in the “Find it Nearby” section 210 of the website. Ads thatare displayed are selected based on the zip code of the user interactingwith the site. Among those selected, Advertisers can buy prominence infour ways. The most basic way is to have their listing boldfaced. Thesecond most prominent is to have their ad boldfaced and highlighted. Thethird is to have their ad featured—this causes it to bubble to the topof the list for a given vendor type. The fourth way is buy one or morezip codes. This supercedes even featured status. Only one advertiser can“own” a given zip code at a time, and so if a certain zip code isreckoned as desirable by more than one advertiser, their time in thatspot is a wait-list consideration that the website must manage.

So if User A is browsing Find it Nearby ads, all possible Advertisersare culled within a ceiling distance to be still considered nearby,presumably no more than 200 miles. Then of these Advertisers, the Systemmust determine if any of these bought the zip code that User A is fromand show that one first. Next, the System must consider thecircumferences that each advertiser bought and find which Advertisersoverlap User A's center. The diagram below illustrates how an advertiserthat is within the bounds of User A's maximum range may not show becausethat advertiser opted for a narrow range, while two others with widerranges manage to overlap User A's center and are therefore includedamong Advertisers displayed in their vendor classification in Find ItNearby:

Advertisers can maintain more than one graphic for their ad and manuallychange which shows when they log in, or they may opt to let the websiteadministrator rotate as many as they have uploaded (up to 10) randomlyto try to catch the user's eye with variance. When an Advertiser runs anad, it is referred to as an Ad Run and the advertiser is asked to assigna name to it. When an ad run expires, the Advertiser can renew the ad,but it is replicated and the user is asked to provide a new name for theAd Run.

Administrators can manage advertiser accounts separately from regularuser accounts and perform a number of reporting functions to gaugeadvertising volume over time and future advertising volume based on adbooking.

This will follow industry standard baseline Administrator permissionscenario whereby tagging an administrative account as Supervisor willassign permission to all available administrative utilities; otherwise,the Administrator is considered Junior and may have access to some orall administrative tools, but each is switched on or off individually byand Administrator who is a Supervisor.

The website will be built using a content management system (CMS) thatallows site Administrators to create new content areas, hide or schedulecontent live and expire times, and create non-hierarchical content thatcan appear in one or more sections of the site. A content managementSystem enforces a high degree of uniformity in the site and governslayout and navigation such that the site should never have broken linksor wide variance in the appearance of content, as is often the case withgeneration one, HTML-based sites.

Part of the basic functioning of the CMS is to allow Administrators tocreate new administrative delegates who may use some or all of theadministrative extranet tools to participate in the management of siteinformation or to obtain reports. The Administrative interface isorganized such that related tools are accessed via a tabbed interfacewith a group label on each tab. When an administrative user logs in,only those tabs that contain permitted admin functions appear, and oneach tab, only the permitted functions. The pilot implementation of theCMS extranet will have a binary Administrator role treatment whereby ifan administrative user is designated to be in a Supervisor role, he orshe automatically has full access to all administrative tools.Otherwise, he or she is by default a junior administrative user and willhave access to some subset of administrative tools arbitrated by thesupervisory administrative user who created the junior account.

Access to administrative tools is a binary consideration for junioradministrative users, whereby if the tool is permitted, the full rangeof its functionality is allowed.

Functions list feature 902 description because of the auctions and otherselling events that take place in the decorative furniture industry, thewebsite owner wishes to include a calendar of events feature 904. Thisconstruct allows the website to generate more content volatility andtherefore create more reasons for users to visit frequently. It also isanother potential use for fee generation by allowing both regular usersand advertisers a means to publicize their upcoming events.

The administrators of the site can populate the calendar from theadministrative extranet using an admin utility provided for the task asshown in FIG. 9. When Administrators post events, they can flag them aswebsite owner events. This means that they are put on or otherwiseorganized by website team members. When they appear on the public sideof the site, they are treated with website branding so that they standout from other events. If this flag is not checked, the event is postedas though it had been submitted by a public user.

Other than website administrators posting calendar content, the calendaris populated by users posting event content from their account area ofthe site. Here they can opt-in to be notified when new events areposted, and/or pay a flat fee in to add a listing the website calendar.

Each listing will have a beginning and end date, full address, cost, andfields for the user to indicated point of contact, phone number, emailaddress and URL to the site, if any. The user can enter an event nameand brief text description of the event before submitting for posting.The user can opt to be credited with posting the event. If they do,their website member name will also appear in the event listing.

Each item posted will be subject to review by a website administrator inthe site pilot, before it is published to the public. When the eventsare accepted by website administrators, they immediately appear on thepublic site in the calendar section. Links to event sites will spawn anew browser.

Functions list content classification standards since the website willutilize a content management system in order to arrange information, weclassify content as being one or the other of two types. The first isHierarchical, or Primary content. This content is organized into ataxonomy of containership. Each content item can accommodate a referenceto an interactive element that appears in the primary content are of thesite. The underlying assumption of primary content is that no twocontent items repeat—each is unique. The other type of contentclassification is referred to as content elements. These are also eachunique, but exist independently of the primary content hierarchy. Thesecontent items may repeat within the site and are used by associatingeach content element Reports can be run by the administrators ondemographics or activity level 1002 as shown in screen display 1000 FIG.10. In FIG. 11, the screen display 110 shows volume plotted over time bywebsite administration.

One of the key features of the present invention is the graphicaltaxonomy used for the website application. To be manageable within thecontext of an internet search, a simply alphabet was created todescribing in images an infinite range of stylistic combinations. Asillustrated in FIG. 12, the chooser attribute labeled “A” is one of thebacks available for selection in the screen display shown in FIG. 5.This constitutes a schematic representation of a real object shown as“B” in FIG. 12. Also in the mind's eye is an approximate interpretationof objects “C”, “D”, “E”, and “F”. This simplification allows eachcomponent part of an object to be approximated by about 40 or so wireform sketches.

The present invention allows for the inclusion of relevant physicalcharacteristics about the unique items listed, such as the physicaldimensions of the item as shown in FIG. 4 such as dimensions, pricerange of interest, materials of construction, age. Also a separate TextBox Searching feature can be made available, element 414. The text boxsearching can be used to match with the sellers listed description ofthe item for sale. These features allow the size, age and actualdimension of an item to be a searchable field, which is important andnot be easily ascertained by viewing image files of an object.

There are several advantages of this service over other services. Thisservice represents the next step in a logical progression of Internetshopping. It builds upon the success of current electronic commercemodels, but goes one step further by abandoning the use of text as asearch tool. It relies on consumers' natural ability to identify whatthey want visually rather than forcing them to describe it with words.

More importantly it allows for mass-customization of information basedon the consumer's geographic location. It will allow consumers to locatevendors within their region who can cater to their needs.

This service model can become the portal for any industry that deals inproducts that are difficult to describe and are desirable only in localmarkets due to transportation costs.

Uses of this inventive service are many. Because this service usesimages rather than text to identify consumer goods, it is accessible toa wide range of users regardless of their education or knowledge ofdescriptive terms. In addition, the service's ability to customizeinformation makes it a desirable advertising medium for all vendors whowish to target their local markets.

The use of images rather than text to guide the consumer though aselection process is a applicable for a variety of industries. Suchindustries would include the Antiques Industry, the Design Industry, theFurniture Industry, the Textile Industry, the Building Industry,Consumer Behavior Researchers, the Jewelry Industry, and the ClothingIndustry. Virtually any industry that is dependent on the consumer'sability to visualize what they want

Fees can be charged for the service. Given the versatility of thisservice it will be attractive to a wide range of users who wish to addtheir list or advertise their goods and services on the site. Naturallythe service will exact a fee for this.

There are three potential sources for revenue from such a service. Alisting fee will be charged to anyone wishing to place their wares forsale on the service. It will be determined by the number of items listedand the duration of their listing. Ebay currently charges a flat listingfee, but charges extra for options that make the item stand out amongothers like bold text and its ranking on the buyers search results.Similar options can be made available on this service as well.

A fee per search could be charged to the seller every time his item isfound in a search. Of course the fee would not exceed a given amount toprotect sellers of highly desirable items from paying more than shouldbe expected.

An advertising fee can be charged given the service's ability to trackbuyers and sellers according to their location, this information can beused to match local advertisers with their target markets. Using thedecorative art market for example, if a buyer locates a chair that is ina shop 20 miles away, not only will service give him the name andaddress of the shop, it will also recommend vendors in the area who canrefinish it, reupholster it and transport it. These vendors will berequired to register for a fee with the service if they are to receivereferrals from it.

Additional fee generating features are the right of first refusal whichbuyers could purchase. This is shown as element 310 on FIG. 3. Buyingthis right affords the buyer the advantage of being notified of an itemmatching stored search criteria with a time limit, say 48 hours, leadtime over any other website buyer who simply has the same search as astored wish list. Stored wish list 312, is a service that may be feebased for providing a search request on the website that is runperiodically, or run upon the uploading of seller content.

While the invention has been described for use as a search function toconsumers of furniture over the Internet, it is to be understood thatthe invention may be used in many other settings without limitation suchas Antiques Industry, the Design Industry, the Furniture Industry, theTextile Industry, the Building Industry, Consumer Behavior Researchers,the Jewelry Industry, and the Clothing Industry. Virtually any industrythat is dependent on the consumer's ability to visualize what they want.Changes may be made within the purview of the appended claims withoutdeparting from the true scope and spirit of the invention in its broaderaspects

1. A computer search engine system for transforming user inputs intoidentification of relevant matches of non-text graphical dataindependently or as an adjunct to a text based search engine comprising:a. a self-contained graphical pairing database running on a computerserver storing inputted graphical images of existing physical objectsand sub-component images thereof; b. a graphical reference libraryresident in the graphical pairing database; the database comprising agraphical alphabet of physical objects by text name, paired with definedplurality of sub-component parts of each object, the sub-component partseach comprising a plurality of sub-graphic images each representing aplurality of variable choices corresponding to a plurality of alterativevisual differences possible for sub-component parts of each physicalobject; c. a presentation screen put before a user, in response to userselection of a searchable physical object from the library of searchablephysical objects, displaying a plurality of subcomponent graphic imagesof the sub-component for user sub-selection of sub-components; d. acomputer processor for transforming user selection of each sub-componentgraphic for each sub-component of the object searched into a searchstring of object plus selected sub-components and applying the searchstring to the pairing data base; f. a visual human readable output ofgraphical representations of physical objects which match the selectedgraphics based criteria; whereby a user input is transformed into agraphical representation of physical objects within the data base whichmatch selected criteria.
 2. The system of claim 1 wherein the graphicalreference library contains an alphabet of limited number of stylesrepresentative of a plurality of stylistic combinations of existingphysical objects.
 3. The system of claim 1 wherein the pairing data baseis further segregated into physical objects by geographical location andwhere one of the sub-components is geographic location of the user andthe object and wherein a match requires a geographic match between theuser and object.
 4. The system of claim 1 wherein geographic location isdetermined by postal code.
 5. The system of claim 1 including a datainput of new physical objects posted by other users.
 6. The system ofclaim 1 including a data input of non-graphical aspects of the physicalobject and wherein the user can specific such non-graphic aspects as afurther limiter of search results.
 7. The system of claim 1 wherein thesearch engine is a sub-search search engine of a primary search engine.